Ukraine War, 1–2 May 2022

Good morning everybody!

Good morning everybody!

Here’s my summary of most important developments in Ukraine on 1 and 2 May 2022.

STRATEGIC

Much of the Western, but also the media elsewhere seems to still be babbling about ongoing negotiations between Russia and Ukraine, and expecting some sort of a peace deal. Indeed, it seems that some of Western politicians are getting tired of the war, and quite a few of politicians elsewhere are trying to push Kyiv into concessions — if for no other reason then to restore the interrupted supply of food from Ukraine.

Well, sorry to disappoint, but: any peace deals would take at least two, and right now I do not see even one. Regardless who is said to be guaranteeing what, Putin’s not even seriously negotiating: this is unsurprising because it would be a ‘political suicide’ for him to accept anything less than ‘at least protection’ of Russia-controlled Donbass (which in turn would be a far cry from all of what he still demands). On the other side, to me it appears the mass of Ukrainians have concluded that a peace deal with Russia is impossible as long as any RFA troops are still in the country — and then no matter where. It’s not only obvious that not only Putin, but the mass of Russians despise Ukraine to the point where they openly support Putin’s war of extermination, but mass atrocities, terror, and looting of areas occupied by the RFA, deportation of more than 1 million of Ukrainians into Russia, and eviction of over 11 million from their homes in the East… well, after all of these horrors, I doubt the people of Ukraine would tolerate their government making any kind of concessions to Putin. In turn, this means that Zelensky cannot accept any kind of solutions short of a full Russian withdrawal, restoration of territorial integrity of Ukraine, and Russian guarantees for the country’s future (i.e. exactly the opposite to what Putin demands).

Therefore, that with restoration of food-exports from Ukraine is going to take a while longer. Those still refusing to accept this fact, still ignoring the fact that Russia is maintaining blockade of Ukrainian ports in the Black Sea, and longing to ‘get back to business as usual’ might want to understand that even if the Russians would completely withdraw in the next five minutes, the carnage and destruction caused by this war are so massive, it would take years to clean the east of Ukraine from all the mines and unexploded ammunition, not to talk about reconstruct the infra-structure and enable ‘normal’ life.

In total, I cannot but repeat myself: this war is going to be decided on the battlefield.

BTW, since the campaign of ‘spontaneous fires’ in Russia is accelerating, and there are really lots of incidents all over the country, there’re now instances — like this one — trying to track all of these down.

AIR

Moscow seems to be both clueless and desperate about the fact that the RFA lacks the means at least to find, not to talk about precisely strike and thus interrupt the flow of Western arms into Ukraine. Instead, the RFA reverted to the most primitive means of searching for targets: ‘scouting by fire’. That is, the Russians are wasting their continuously decreasing stock of cruise missiles to target whatever storage facilities they think might be used to hide Western weapons.

With other words: after hospitals and apartment buildings, the new priority for Russian targeting lists in Ukraine are hangars, garages, warehouses etc. A ‘good example’ of this occurred in the Dnipropetrovsk area, on 1 May: a cruise missile went off in between two warehouses of an agricultural enterprise in the Synelynkovsky District. One hangar was badly damaged (see attached photo), the other destroyed.

For those still thinking the Keystone Cops are running their operations based on my summaries: yesterday, on 2 May, a P-800 Onyx cruise missile hit the Zatoka Bridge, south of Odessa. Amount of damage remains unknown. Mind: I didn’t mention that bridge with a single word for at least four days.

Another Onyx hit an apartment building in Odessa yesterday, killing a 14-years old child and wounding several others.

Talking about missile strikes: the People in Need of Fresh Air say, the Russians have fired 1,215 ballistic missiles at Ukraine so far. Much less clear is the number of cruise missiles released by now: figures are ranging from around 900 to over 1,900. Part of this depends on what weapons are counted as such: for example, some seem to include Kh-35 (ASCC/NATO-codename ‘AS-20 Kayak’), Kh-59 Ovod (‘AS-13 Kingbolt’), and Kh-59M Ovod-M (‘AS-18 Kazoo’) land-attack/anti-ship missiles, apparently because the latter have, depending on variant, a range of up to 200km.

Of the Russian ‘flying stuff’, most active over the last two days were Russian Orlan reconnaissance UAVs — and then over all the frontlines in eastern and southern Ukraine. Unsurprisingly, the defenders claimed ten of these shot down on 1 May alone. Another eight were claimed as shot down on 2 May, including a Forpost that attempted to reach Odessa (Forpost is the Russian version of the Israeli-made Searcher).

In turn, the Russians claimed an Ukrainian Mi-8 helicopter shot down by a MANPAD, but provided no details, and the Keystone Cops have published this video, purportedly shown destruction of the S-300 fire-control radar by an Iskander-K missile:

NAVAL

Following the Ukrainian strike at the Russian electronic warfare facilities on the Zmiyniy Island, on 30 April, the Russian Navy is down to keeping the island supplied with help of Raptor-class speedboats — and this effort is now interdicted by Ukrainian UAVs: on 1 May, they claimed the destruction of two such boats — both by Bayraktars.

BATTLE OF DONBASS

Following an Ukrainian artillery strike on a Russian command post near Izium, on 30 April, Kyiv claimed the death or injury of up to 20 high-ranking officers. Some sources claimed even Gerasimov was wounded. As usually, there’s no clear confirmation for any of related reports: but, there’s no denial that the activity of RFA in eastern Ukraine slowed down by quite some, at least for 36 hours after that attack, before it was ‘back to normal, yesterday, on 2 May.

In general, it seems that during 1 May, the RFA began re-deploying whatever ‘reserves’ it was able to find along different sectors of the frontline, and concentrating these in relatively few ‘hotspots’. One is the well-known area south of Izium; the other Lyman, the third Rubizhne, the fourth Popasna, and the fifth was the area south of Kryviy Rihh. At least three of these areas have received contingents of 500 combatants from the Wagner PMC, each, too.

Combat-wise, the RFA ‘only’ shelled Ukrainian frontlines south of Izium: the Ukrainian 25th Airborne (AFAIK, a new arrival in this area) hit back in fashion. That said, Russian reports are indicating plenty of small-scale engagements like this one, in which Ukrainian T-64 was knocked out by RFA’s tanks:

Active combat was reported solely from Velyka Komyshuvakha. The most active was the sector between Krymsky and Yampil, where the RFA attempted to push the defenders against Donets. The latter of the two is about 25km east of Slovyansk, and 40km west of Severodonetsk, and came under a pincer attack. One of resulting engagements was particularly interesting. Over the last 3–4 weeks, there was a growing number of reports about the Russians trying to adapt the tactics of the Ukrainian Army, and operating in small units to hit the defenders where they expect this the least. Well, in at least one case, this idea ended in an ambush, in which a squad from the 24th Spetsnaz Brigade was destroyed to the last (graphic!) while trying to infiltrate Ukrainian positions in forests surrounding Yampil.

Further East…. On 1 May, the RFA attempted to assault remaining Ukrainian positions in southern Rubizhne, and failed. Following a hours-long artillery barrage, it tried again on 2 May, and failed once again. It was similar in the Popasna area, in Ozerne and Mariinka: all assaults remained unsuccessful.

BTW, Separatists — who are continuously complaining about murderous effectiveness of the Ukrainian artillery — are reporting that the Ukrainians have concrete bunkers inside Popasna, equipped with armoured shutters: whenever encircled by the Russians, they call artillery fire on their own positions, until the Separatists and Russians are either destroyed or forced to withdraw. ….and they are reporting murderous attacks by Ukrainian Bayraktar UAVs: just one of these should’ve killed 19 troops.

MARIUPOL

On 1 May, about 100 civilians have been evacuated out of the Azovstal complex — with the assistance of the UN and the Red Cross. The latter two announced their intention to evacuate civilians from three other points around the city, on 2 May, too.

While the evacuation on 1 May was going on, there was a ceasefire: immediately after, the RFA followed Putin’s TV-order and resumed shelling: indeed, on 2 May it forced the defenders to withdraw from the northern section of the Azovstal complex — even if it then stopped and, apparently, enabled the evacuation of additional civilians.

BTW, over the last two days, the RFA concluded the re-deployment of its troops from Mariupol: the city is now controlled by Separatist units. Interestingly, the troops in question were not used to bolster Zusko’s 58th CAA, but sent to Popasna instead. I.e. it seems the Keystone Cops in Moscow are abandoning their offensive efforts along the southern frontlines, and fully concentrating on punching through the LOC.

SOUTH

Over the last two days, the Russians continued shelling Osokorivka, Trudoliubivka, and Kniazivka. Fighting inside Tarvriiske went on, but serious Russian ground attacks were reported only from Zahradivka and Ivanivka (both were repelled). Mykolaiv is continuously hit by multiple rocket launchers: no casualties have been reported, but the city is out of water. In turn, the Ukrainian artillery hit a Russian ammunition depot in Chornobaivka.